SECTION: RESEARCH

POPULATION growth has crunched the average time on the market of new lots in Melbourne from more than six months to just 30 days since 2012, according to Oliver Hume research.

The June quarter figure is the shortest average period recorded, with average time on market having fallen or remained steady in every quarter since Q3 of 2013, barring the Q1 of 2015.

The peak was 6.6 months at the end of 2012.

The growing rush to secure land has seen prices in the June quarter jumper from $640 per sqm to $654 per sqm. Median land prices rose by 2.3% to $268,000, and the median lot size has waned from 410 sqm to 403 sqm.

Oliver Hume research manager, George Bougias, said Melbourne’s record population growth was the principal driver of demand for new land.

“Recent figures from the ABS show Melbourne had the largest growth of any capital over the last 10 years with nearly one million (964,600) extra people now calling the city home and a total population of about 4.72 million.

“These people have to live somewhere.

“There is a range of reasons people want to live in Melbourne. Housing affordability, lifestyle and economic opportunity are the main reasons but as a city we are doing a great job of attracting people to live here,” he added.

Melbourne was yesterday named The Economist’s world’s most liveable city for the seventh consecutive year.

Oliver Hume director Paul Ciprian said land was attracting a wide variety of buyers including first home buyers, investors and value hunters from around Australia, including Sydney.

“Over the last couple of years we have seen an ever-increasing number of people priced out of the Sydney market looking to set up their life in Melbourne,” he said. “If your job and family is transferrable, the decision is pretty simple.”

Five of the ten locations with the largest population growth in Australia over the decade to the end of June 2016 were suburbs of Greater Melbourne, including Tarneit in the outer-west, which grew by 28,800 people, inner-city Melbourne with 26,200, and Cranbourne East in the south-east with 22,600.

Bougias said the population of Melbourne would continue to grow strongly well into the future, and probably outstrip most official forecasts.

“The most recent projections contained in Victoria in Future 2016, released last year, suggest Melbourne will reach five million people in the early part of the next decade.

“Given current rates of growth and actual population growth has consistently outstripped projections, we think it is likely that Melbourne will reach five million people before 2021,” he concluded.